1. Field of the Invention
The present invention related to a door lock formed integrally with a door hinge having two hinge halves attachable, respectively, to the motor vehicle door and a respective motor vehicle door pillar, and a hinge pin for connecting the first and second hinge halves and supported in one of the two hinge halves with a running fit and removably secured in another of the two hinge halves without a possibility of rotation with respect to the another of the hinge halves, with the door lock including a locking element having at least one detente point and at least one brake and locking member cooperating with the locking element, with the locking element being formed as a circular track concentric with respect to the hinge pin axis and secured to the one of the first and second hinge halves for joint rotation therewith, and with the brake and locking member being operationally connected with the hinge pin and arranged radially outwardly of the hinge pin.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In a door lock which is formed integrally with a door hinge and in which the locking element is connected for joint rotation with a hinge half, in which the hinge pin is supported with a running fit, and is formed as a circular track concentric with the hinge pin axis and having indentations defining the detent points, the brake and locking members are formed as rolling bodies and are supported on axles which extend transverse to the hinge pin axis. The brake and locking members cooperate, when biased against the locking element by a loading spring supported against a collar or similar means provided at the free end of the hinge pin, with the detent points provided on the track. Such a door lock permits to advantageously reduce the dimensions of the door hinge-door lock assembly which results in less space required for such an assembly. Additional advantages of such a door lock consists in that the door lock construction permits to reduce substantially the manufacturing costs and insures a noiseless operation of the assembly. The drawbacks of such door hinge-door lock assembly consist in that the loading spring is formed by a stack of spring washers and acts on a middle region of the carrier of the brake and locking members, which surrounds the hinge pin. As a result, with unfavorable tolerance pairings, retaining the door in the predetermined opening positions of the door is not always possible, and/or the braking and retaining force applied to the door in a predetermined position is not always adequate.
Accordingly, an object of the invention is to so improve the door lock for a motor vehicle door, which is formed integrally with a demountable door hinge, that it insures an exact locking of the door in a predetermined braking and locking position of the door and a most possible noiseless operation of the door lock, independent of possible tolerance deviations.